We need to make it cool to come back to church

Wednesday

Millennials became the primary consumers of thousands of competing voices. Meanwhile, the wisest and steadiest of voices have been pushed into the background.

Religion just isn't cool anymore. Not only is religion not cool anymore, but religion is stifling us as a civilization.That's the sentiment I get from a lot of millennial contemporaries.

These are the things we're learning in schools, in the media, online and in conversations with friends. We're told that to believe in those ancient fairy tales and try to live our lives accordingly is to ignorantly waste our lives and deprive ourselves of living a “full life.” Millennials, by the numbers, just don't think much of religion.

The word “religion” has an interesting background. It comes from a Latin word meaning “to re-bind” or “to re-connect.” A religion is meant to “rebind or “reconnect” people back to the God, a creator, or an intelligent designer.

That can't be so bad, can it? Well, it can be if we're confused about who and what to worship, and in what manner we should worship.

In my opinion, the greatest challenge that the millennial generation will face is that of confusion. We are a generation living in the greatest state of confusion this world has ever seen. There are so many competing voices in this information age. The older end of the millennial spectrum literally watched the internet and social media become a reality. We became smarter, and simultaneously more confused. More anxious. More sad. More envious.

I'll never forget that eerie, scratchy, annoyingly loud sound our computer used to make as we'd use our dial-up landline to jump on the internet for a few minutes a day. There weren't too many websites, or too many voices on the internet in those days. Back then, studying the scriptures, kneeling down to pray, and seeking guidance from parents and wise, older church leaders seemed much more prevalent.

But then something changed. The world began to rely on another god for answers to their deepest questions. The embodiment of this new god took the shape of a giant web. The World Wide Web.

There's been a great deal of goodness that has come out of that web, but at the same time, and maybe even more detrimental, are the souls of men and women who have gotten tangled up in that web. Tangled … and stuck. Confused and paralyzed.

We slowly became like those knowledgeable Greeks who were “ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.” We became like the people of Athens whom Paul described as spending "their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing.”

Young inquiring millennial minds who were just looking for answers became the primary consumers of thousands of competing and compelling voices. We scroll and scroll and scroll — just looking for something new to hear and something new to tell.

Meanwhile, the wisest and steadiest of voices have been pushed into the background, and the concept of religion — or binding and connecting with an unseen historical figure from the past — becomes more and more unbelievable.

And what a sad, sad thing that is. Because millennial have a heart for causes. We have a heart for helping people. We have a heart for religion … for reconciliation, and for loving others. Only the world and its competing voices have told them that we're too smart, too enlightened and too educated for that kind of nonsense.

Millennials were built for religion. Their hearts were built for and to align with the cause of Christ more so than any other generation I've ever studied. But sadly, those hearts are not being utilized in the way that they should — they are are only being utilized for temporal purposes, instead of both temporal and eternal purposes.

So many millennials serve at homeless shelters, volunteer for causes and bless people with their service — but at the same time believe the work they are doing is only good for this temporal life, because after we die, then that is the end. They are walking in the footsteps of Christ, but with no eternal purpose.

I believe the turmoil so many millennials are going through right now would be remedied by simply coming back to Christ, giving him a chance, joining the cause he started 2,000-plus years ago, and being given a sense of divine purpose that extends beyond just this life.

The world needs millennials to make going to church cool again. The world needs millennials to make rebinding and reconnecting with God cool again. As a world, and as a generation, whatever we're doing to try and be happy doesn't seem to be working. So why not give binding ourselves back to Christ a try? There is literally nothing to lose.

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